The Arizona sentinel., 1887-09-24
CHINESE EOOT-GEAR.
A Country Where a Mans Station in Life
 Is Indicated by His Shoes.


 Is Indicated by His Shoes.
 Chinese shoes are apt to appear to us all very much alike, and, looking at ancient pictures, they seem as if they had been the same as far back as we can go. An intelligent Mongolian in this city, however, assures the writer that this is not so, and that great changes of fashion have occurred in later years. while the shoes of different classes of people differ both as to shape and material. No doubt it is a weak ness of ours, which causes us to think every Chinaman's shoes to be indis= tinguishable from his neighbor's, just as we fancy all their faces to be very much alike. In China, notwiths tand- ing, it appears that the shoe, as well as the other portions of costume, is significant of one's station in life. Thus the working-man wears particular shape and color, the learned man another, and the Mandarin another. You look at a mans shoes and you can tell his rank. 1llO OOOio SLC1ll1, and there is a curious custom in con- nection with them. When he gives up office as governor of a district or province, the heads of the various de- partments wait upon him and request his boots, which are placed in the tenn pie. They at the same time make him pres sent of considerable sums of money.
 The ordinary shoe has a sole of felt with an upper of cotton. A single piece of leather is sewed on under the felt which is about an inch thick. The sides of the sole are painted white. Great numbers of these are imported into this country and sell at $1.50; they may be bought in China for about ninety cents. A Chicago gentlemaR, who was for years q resident in China, informs the writer that he found these extremely comfortable for moving about his house and garden.
 The upper classes go in for embroid- cry on their shoes and slippers on an extensive and artistic scale, but could not learn of any article which would cost more than four dollars. The effect of the embroidery is mostly very pleasing. It is always what may be called surface decoration. The general guiding forms are first considered, and these are decorated. The flowers are not natural flowers. We do not see, as in our work, a highly wrought imi- tation of natural flower with its light and shade struggling to stand out from the surface on which it is placed, but a conventional representation sufficient ly near to suggest an image to the mind. Mems dress boots or shoes are of velvet or satin with the universal white soles.
 Chinese ladies, like those of other lands. pride themselves on the small ness of their feet, but in no other part of the world is so unnatural a method employed to secure the desired end. All the Chinese, who can afford it, cause the uniformed bone of the female infant to be broken. and the toes to be bent beneath the palm of the foot. In this way the foot is band aged and not allowed to grow. The result is a miraculously small foot a large unwieldy ankle and no calf, The pain of the alteration in the direction of the bone frequently kill the sufferer. Yet mothers take a pride in submitting their children to this dreadful ordeal. When these grow up they have Iimping gait, and there are frequent falls, often resulting in serious injury and broken bones. This barbarous custom is practiced not only among fine ladies, who can ride in sedan chairs, but among the poorer classes, who have to toll all day in the felds.-Shoe and Leather ReUie1o